[News] Animal rights activist rebuffs federal grand jury

Sat Aug 28 12:52:59 EDT 2004

Thursday, August 26, 2004

Animal rights activist rebuffs federal grand jury

By PAUL SHUKOVSKY SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

An animal rights activist suspected by the FBI of an arson targeting an 
Olympia timber company refused to answer questions before a federal grand 
jury yesterday and could go to jail today for contempt of court.

"It's about political resistance," Gina Lynn, 32, of Orange County, Calif., 
said of her refusal to cooperate with a grand jury investigating the fire 
bombing of Holbrook Inc. at about 2:30 a.m. on May 7, 2000. That same 
morning, someone broke into the Dai-Zen Egg Farm in Burlington and stole 
228 chickens.

The Earth Liberation Front issued a communique claiming responsibility for 
the arson on behalf of a previously unknown group called Revenge of the 
Trees. And the Animal Liberation Front announced that the chickens had been 
placed in "loving homes."

On the advice of her attorney, Lynn would not discuss specifics of either 
event yesterday. But as she stood in front of the U.S. District Courthouse 
flanked by 16 supporters carrying signs excoriating the grand jury system, 
Lynn declared herself a "target because I'm known in the (animal rights) 
movement and I have a record for protest-related arrests."

Lynn, who has been a vegetarian and subsequently a vegan since she was 11, 
joined her first protest at 15 after realizing "how systematic the killing 
of animals is and how bad the suffering. I had to do something about it."

Asked how far she is willing to go in her battle for animals, she said: "I 
don't engage in underground activities. There are some things I think are 
great, and I'm glad they happen, but I wouldn't participate myself" in 
activities such as animal releases.

"Anything that gets animals out of the horrible condition they're in, I'm 
not going to say that's a bad thing. It's not something I would feel 
comfortable with, but I would hesitate to condemn it."

Lynn is the third animal rights activist this year who has tangled with the 
federal grand jury meeting in Seattle.

Last month, animal rights activist Kim Berardi spent a few days at the 
Federal Detention Center in SeaTac after she refused to answer the grand 
jury's questions.

And activist Allison Lance Watson is scheduled to go on trial next month, 
accused of lying to the grand jury about whether a truck she had rented was 
used by anyone else, including her longtime friend Gina Lynn.

In May 2000, Watson and her husband, Paul Watson -- best known in 
Washington for leading protests in 1999 when the Makah Tribe resumed its 
practice of hunting gray whales -- rented a Penske truck to haul equipment 
between the Southern California office of Paul Watson's Sea Shepherd 
Conservation Society and the organization's headquarters in Friday Harbor.

At 8:30 a.m. on May 7, 2000 -- just a few hours after the arson and the 
chicken release -- a Penske truck pulled into a convenience store lot in 
Rochester, about 12 miles south of Olympia, according to court documents. A 
store employee reported that "the occupants of the truck dumped a number of 
plastic bags containing clothes in a Dumpster behind the store." The 
truck's plate matched the one rented by Watson, according to court documents.

Police called to the scene found five bags containing "three sets of dark 
clothes, two black ski masks, three pairs of gloves, a wrapper from a pair 
of bolt cutters and a wrapper of wire ties." The clothes were wet and 
covered with grass.

And the FBI obtained footage from the store's surveillance camera and 
identified two people in the truck, one of them Gina Lynn.

The Justice Department gave Lynn a form of immunity that precludes the use 
of any testimony she gives before the grand jury in future prosecutions 
against her. But it does not prevent the government from bringing charges 
against her based on other evidence.

Now that she has been granted immunity, a judge could rule that Lynn no 
longer is protected by her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination 
and thus is required to answer grand jury questions.

If Lynn continues to refuse to answer questions, U.S. District Judge Thomas 
Zilly could decide to jail her until she either changes her mind or the 
grand jury finishes its work.

Link: 
<http://www.infoshop.org/inews/portal.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nocompromise.org%2F&what=T_IndexLinks&rid=34388>http://www.nocompromise.org/
Source: 
<http://www.infoshop.org/inews/portal.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fseattlepi.nwsource.com%2Flocal%2F187951_grandjury26.html&what=T_IndexLinks&rid=34390>http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/187951_grandjury26.html

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